Multihierarchical Interactive Task Planning: Application to Mobile Robotics

To date, no solution has been proposed to human-machine interactive task planning that deals simultaneously with two important issues: 1) the capability of processing large amounts of information in planning (as it is needed in any real application) and 2) being efficient in human-machine communication (a proper set of symbols for human-machine interaction may not be suitable for efficient automatic planning and vice versa). In this paper, we formalize a symbolic model of the environment to solve these issues in a natural form through a human-inspired mechanism that structures knowledge in multiple hierarchies. Planning with a hierarchical model may be efficient even in cases where the lack of hierarchical information would make it intractable. However, in addition, our multihierarchical model is able to use the symbols that are most familiar to each human user for interaction, thus achieving efficiency in human-machine communication without compromising the task-planning performance. We formalize here a general interactive task-planning process which is then particularized to be applied to a mobile robotic application. The suitability of our approach has been demonstrated with examples and experiments.

[1]  Horatiu Voicu,et al.  Hierarchical cognitive maps , 2003, Neural Networks.

[2]  Cipriano Galindo,et al.  Assistive navigation of a robotic wheelchair using a multihierarchical model of the environment , 2004, Integr. Comput. Aided Eng..

[3]  Cipriano Galindo,et al.  Multi-hierarchical semantic maps for mobile robotics , 2005, 2005 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems.

[4]  C. Galindo,et al.  Control Architecture for Human–Robot Integration: Application to a Robotic Wheelchair , 2006, IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics, Part B (Cybernetics).

[5]  R. Dillmann,et al.  Interactive Natural Programming of Robots : Introductory Overview , 2002 .

[6]  Ranjan Mukherjee,et al.  A shared-control approach to haptic interface design for minimally invasive telesurgical training , 2005, IEEE Transactions on Control Systems Technology.

[7]  Yong K. Hwang,et al.  Interactive task planning through natural language , 1996, Proceedings of IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation.

[8]  Earl D. Sacerdott.  Planning in a hierarchy of abstraction spaces , 1973, IJCAI 1973.

[9]  Kazuo Tanie,et al.  Human interaction with a service robot: mobile-manipulator handing over an object to a human , 1997, Proceedings of International Conference on Robotics and Automation.

[10]  J Jonides,et al.  PET evidence for multiple strategies of categorization , 2001, Cognitive, affective & behavioral neuroscience.

[11]  Javier Gonzalez,et al.  Multi-Hierarchical Representation of Large-Scale Space , 2001 .

[12]  Dana Kulic,et al.  Pre-collision safety strategies for human-robot interaction , 2007, Auton. Robots.

[13]  Cipriano Galindo,et al.  Improving efficiency in mobile robot task planning through world abstraction , 2004, IEEE Transactions on Robotics.

[14]  Alain Pruski,et al.  An autonomous vehicle for people with motor disabilities , 2001, IEEE Robotics Autom. Mag..

[15]  Fumio Miyazaki,et al.  FAce MOUSe: A novel human-machine interface for controlling the position of a laparoscope , 2003, IEEE Trans. Robotics Autom..

[16]  T. McNamara,et al.  Subjective hierarchies in spatial memory. , 1989, Journal of experimental psychology. Learning, memory, and cognition.

[17]  Manuel Mazo,et al.  Electro-Oculographic Guidance of a Wheelchair Using Eye Movements Codification , 2003, Int. J. Robotics Res..

[18]  M. Ghorbel,et al.  Toward a generic human machine interface for assistive robots: the AMOR project , 2005, 9th International Conference on Rehabilitation Robotics, 2005. ICORR 2005..

[19]  Dong-Soo Kwon,et al.  Emotional interaction model for a service robot , 2005, ROMAN 2005. IEEE International Workshop on Robot and Human Interactive Communication, 2005..

[20]  Cynthia Breazeal,et al.  Affective Touch for Robotic Companions , 2005, ACII.

[21]  Richard J Trudeau,et al.  Introduction to Graph Theory , 1994 .

[22]  Craig A. Knoblock.  Automatically Generating Abstractions for Planning , 1994, Artif. Intell..

[23]  C. Galindo,et al.  A description of the SENA robotic wheelchair , 2006, MELECON 2006 - 2006 IEEE Mediterranean Electrotechnical Conference.

[24]  Dana Kulic,et al.  Strategies for safety in human robot interaction , 2003 .

[25]  G.E. Birch,et al.  Brain interface research for asynchronous control applications , 2006, IEEE Transactions on Neural Systems and Rehabilitation Engineering.

[26]  E. Sandberg,et al.  Cognitive Constraints on the Development of Hierarchical Spatial Organization Skills , 1999 .

[27]  Carol S. Holding,et al.  Further evidence for the hierarchical representation of spatial information , 1994 .

[28]  M.M. Moore,et al.  Real-world applications for brain-computer interface technology , 2003, IEEE Transactions on Neural Systems and Rehabilitation Engineering.

[29]  Benjamin Kuipers,et al.  The Cognitive Map: Could It Have Been Any Other Way? , 1983 .

[30]  Stevan Harnad,et al.  Symbol grounding problem , 1990, Scholarpedia.

[31]  F. Marrone.  Compliant Interaction of a Domestic Service Robot with a Human and the Environment , 2002 .

[32]  Hujun Bao,et al.  Interactive task planning in virtual assembly , 1999, VRST '99.

[33]  Reiner Onken,et al.  Cognitive man-machine-cooperation: modeling operators' general objectives and its role within a cockpit assistant system , 2000, Smc 2000 conference proceedings. 2000 ieee international conference on systems, man and cybernetics. 'cybernetics evolving to systems, humans, organizations, and their complex interactions' (cat. no.0.

[34]  Robin R. Murphy,et al.  Emotion-based control of cooperating heterogeneous mobile robots , 2002, IEEE Trans. Robotics Autom..

[35]  Bernhard Nebel,et al.  The FF Planning System: Fast Plan Generation Through Heuristic Search , 2011, J. Artif. Intell. Res..

[36]  Rod M. Burstall,et al.  Computational category theory , 1988, Prentice Hall International Series in Computer Science.

[37]  Byung-Uk Choi,et al.  Hierarchical Task Planning through Abstraction of World Elements and Operators , 2007 .

[38]  Alessandro Saffiotti,et al.  Life-Long Optimization of the Symbolic Model of Indoor Environments for a Mobile Robot , 2007, IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics, Part B (Cybernetics).

[39]  Benjamin Kuipers,et al.  The Spatial Semantic Hierarchy , 2000, Artif. Intell..

[40]  Alessandro Saffiotti,et al.  An introduction to the anchoring problem , 2003, Robotics Auton. Syst..

[41]  Richard E. Korf,et al.  Planning as Search: A Quantitative Approach , 1987, Artif. Intell..

[42]  Sebastian Thrun,et al.  Toward a Framework for Human-Robot Interaction , 2004, Hum. Comput. Interact..

[43]  Fausto Giunchiglia,et al.  A Theory of Abstraction , 1992, Artif. Intell..

[44]  Joelle Pineau,et al.  A Hierarchical Approach to POMDP Planning and Execution , 2004 .

[45]  Terrence Fong,et al.  Vehicle Teleoperation Interfaces , 2001, Auton. Robots.

[46]  A. R. Diéguez,et al.  A ROBUST STOCHASTIC SUPERVISION ARCHITECTURE FOR AN INDOOR MOBILE ROBOT , 2022 .

[47]  Javier González,et al.  An Entropy-Based Measurement of Certainty in Rao-Blackwellized Particle Filter Mapping , 2006, 2006 IEEE/RSJ International Conference on Intelligent Robots and Systems.

[48]  Barbara Tversky,et al.  Cognitive Maps, Cognitive Collages, and Spatial Mental Models , 1993, COSIT.

[49]  Richard Kennaway,et al.  Graph Rewriting in Some Categories of Partial Morphisms , 1990, Graph-Grammars and Their Application to Computer Science.

[50]  Gautam Biswas,et al.  Interactive task planning under uncertainty and goal changes , 1996, Robotics Auton. Syst..

[51]  Young Sik Yoon,et al.  Designing a human-robot interaction framework for home service robot , 2005, ROMAN 2005. IEEE International Workshop on Robot and Human Interactive Communication, 2005..

[52]  Jean Scholtz,et al.  Theory and evaluation of human robot interactions , 2003, 36th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences, 2003. Proceedings of the.

[53]  J. Jonides,et al.  Evidence of hierarchies in cognitive maps , 1985, Memory & cognition.

[54]  Javier González,et al.  Multihierarchical Graph Search , 2002, IEEE Trans. Pattern Anal. Mach. Intell..

[55]  Avrim Blum,et al.  Fast Planning Through Planning Graph Analysis , 1995, IJCAI.